Harvesting Plant Methylomes using MspJI-seq

Great news especially for plant labs! Researchers from BGI, and their collaborators, have shown that using the restriction enzyme MspJI upstream of next generation sequencing, is very effective to produce high resolution, ~50% representative plant methylomes. MspJI-seq Arabidopsis methylome data was BETTER than MeDIP-seq and MBD-seq data. MspJI-seq data sensitivity and specificity was comparable with whole genome bisulfite sequencing, (WGBS) data. Geneticists have used Arabidopsis, as a model organism, to produce much of the basic knowledge concerning DNA methylation in plants. However, most plants generally have very large and repetitive genomes – compared to mammalian cells. That translates into very large price tags for bisulfite sequencing. (Yikes!) The BGI authors stated that they have produced a plant methylome mapping method … Continue reading →